Thursday, June 16, 2016

7 Years Ago, Madison Reminded Us... RYS Flashback.

Tuesday, June 16, 2009Madison from Monona Metes Out Some Moderation.

Graphic placed here for Ben's benefit.

Doesn’t anyone on this blog remember what it was like to be an undergrad?

Don’t you remember the excitement of being on your own, the fascination that came from time to time when you had a lightbulb moment in class, the realization that you could eat whenever and whatever you wanted? (Until you gained the Freshman Fifteen.) And what about That Event, the thing that suddenly showed you why you had to stop sleeping through class and trying to scrape together last minute poor excuses for homework? The thing that ultimately led you to grad school and teaching?

I cannot understand why you take plagiarism personally, or skipping class personally, or sleeping during class personally. I remember having to choose between a paper or working a shift, and being dead jealous of all my friends who could go out. Sometimes I went with them and winged it in class. I never made those choices because I thought my female profs were too female, or other profs were too short, or whatever you guys are so nervous about. (Although I was suspicious of the flustered prof who seemed unfamiliar with their (sic) subject.)

As a teacher, I give extensions if a student is willing to ask before assignments are late. I give as many excused absences as they want, as long as they contact me before the beginning of discussion. I feel it rewards those who know they will be doing other things, rather than those who sleep in. And as a result, most of my students don’t bother lying and plagiarizing. And the few who do regret it when I remind them that all they needed to do was email me before class.

Students will always push their boundaries. They’re teenagers. It’s what they do. I don’t take this testing of the authority waters personally, and I give them second chances that don’t involve me dedicating more time. I change due dates last minute so that students have an extra 2 days to take that piece of crap and turn it into something halfway decent. I listen to the cock-and-bull story about sick grandmas and interpret them as “I screwed up, but I don’t want to just give you shit. Please let me work through this.” And as a result, instead of handing me shit, they learn a goddamn lesson. But you know what? Teaching them how to write is my job. Teaching analysis is my job. Teaching citations again and again: it’s my job.

Getting personally insulted that they didn’t follow my instructions to the letter? NOT my job.

9 comments:

Well, aren't you special? I think you have mistaken frustration, disillusionment, and disappointment for insult, but whatevs.

Attributing students' slackitude and deception to things other than their wanting to get under your skin is healthy and all, but giving them so many passes on matters of professionallism is not. Not for them, for you, or your colleagues. Just because you were a fuckup undergrad doesn't mean your professors should have let you get away with fucking up---I bet they didn't---and it's no justification for letting your students get away with same. They are teenagers, yes, but they are also supposed to be putting away their childish things. In your zeal to avoid being the authoritarian parent and to be the cool sibling, you've become a doormat.

The author is right - don't take students' shit personally. They are just not very good at being adults.

Having said that, the author is teaching students two lessons. The first is, I assume, the intended lesson: writing is harder than you thought and now you know that you need to spend lots of time on it. The second, unintended lesson is that there are some people in life who will not hold you to standards of punctuality and other seemingly arbitrary rules. Students, like the author, might assume that everybody should be like that. Engineers, IRS auditors, and journal editors would beg to differ.

Extending the deadline at the last minute is a slap in the face to the students who actually finished the assignment. "Hey, thanks for missing out on that job interview/dream date/trip to Disneyland because you believed me when I said the paper was due Friday. Turns out it was all for nothing, because I'm going to extend the deadline to make sure the slackers can catch up."

Of course every lenient policy you set means that sooner or later some student is going to take advantage of you. I'm forever weighing the pros and cons of treating students like grown-ups versus well defined regimentation and those of a forgiving attitude towards the occasional tardy assignment versus making everyone hit the same deadline. Where is the line between a flexible approach to differing needs on one hand and being a ineffectual chump on the other? I don't know!

I usually go for some kind of pre-defined, built-in leniency. I have six mid-terms in my intro classes, and I drop the worst. Can't make a test? Well, that's your drop. Same for labs. Need an extension on the homework? Just ask, but I'll write your name down and if you ask for a third I'll make you come to my office for a chat first.

I was a program coordinator, once, long ago, and I dealt with this issue all the time. I tended towards strict rules but, if I had more time to deal with exceptions to the rules and if my school had a greater sense of community, I could see myself becoming more lenient towards those students who had a good reason to miss the assignment but nonetheless lacked an official excused absence.

I was a good undergraduate student, but not the greatest. I loved to procrastinate, I didn't always do the reading, and sometimes my attendance wasn't very good. I sometimes submitted papers late--papers that weren't very well written. So, I try to remember this when my own students are less than perfect. However, I never thought my professors should be lenient with me, and I never asked a professor for an extension, even for a "legitimate" reason. For some reason, I understood that deadline are deadlines and due dates are due dates, not simply suggestions.

What Was This?

College Misery was a dysfunctional group blog where professors got the chance to release some of the frustration that built up while tending to student snowflakes, helicopter parents, money mad Deans, envious colleagues, and churlish chairpeople.

Our parent site, Rate Your Students, started in 2005, and we continued that mission beginning in 2010. Ben at Academic Water Torture and Kimmie at The Apoplectic Mizery Maker both ran support blogs during periods when this blog had died.